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Air VIII. Grim king of the ghosts, etc.
Polly
Can love be controlled by advice? Will Cupid our mothers obey? Though my heart were as frozen as ice, At his flame ’twould have melted away. When he kissed me so closely he pressed, ’Twas so sweet that I must have complied: So I thought it both safest and best To marry, for fear you should chide.
Mrs. Peachum
Then all the hopes of our family are gone forever and ever!
Peachum
And Macheath may hang his father and mother-in-law, in hope to get into their daughter’s fortune.
Polly
I did not marry him (as ’tis the fashion) coolly and deliberately for honour or money. But, I love him.
Mrs. Peachum
Love him! worse and worse! I thought the girl had been better bred. Oh husband, husband! her folly makes me mad! my head swims! I’m distracted! I can’t support myself—Oh! Faints.
Peachum
See, wench, to what a condition you have reduced your poor mother! a glass of cordial, this instant. How the poor woman takes it to heart!
Polly goes out, and returns with it.
Ah, hussy, now this is the only comfort your mother has left!
Polly
Give her another glass, sir! my mama drinks double the quantity whenever she is out of order. This, you see, fetches her.
Mrs. Peachum
The girl shows such a readiness, and so much concern, that I could almost find in my heart to forgive her.
Air IX. O Jenny, O Jenny, where hast thou been.
O Polly, you might have toyed and kissed. By keeping men off, you keep them on.
Polly
But he so teased me, And he so pleased me, What I did, you must have done.
Mrs. Peachum
Not with a highwayman.—You sorry slut!
Peachum
A word with you, wife. ’Tis no new thing for a wench to take man without consent of parents. You know ’tis the frailty of women, my dear.
Mrs. Peachum
Yes, indeed, the sex is frail. But the first time a woman is frail, she should be somewhat nice methinks, for then or never is the time to make her fortune. After that, she hath nothing to do but to guard herself from being found out, and she may do what she pleases.
Peachum
Make yourself a little easy; I have a thought shall soon set all matters again to rights. Why so melancholy, Polly? since what is done cannot be undone, we must all endeavour to make the best of it.
Mrs. Peachum
Well, Polly; as far as one woman can forgive another, I forgive thee.—Your father is too fond of you, hussy.
Polly
Then all my sorrows are at an end.
Mrs. Peachum
A mighty likely speech in troth, for a wench who is just married!
Air X. Thomas, I cannot, etc.
Polly
I, like a ship in storms, was tossed; Yet afraid to put in to land: For seized in the port the vessel’s lost, Whose treasure is contraband. The waves are laid, My duty’s paid. O joy beyond expression! Thus, safe ashore, I ask no more, My all is in my possession.
Peachum
I hear customers in t’other room: Go, talk with ’em, Polly; but come to us again, as soon as they are gone.—But, hark ye, child, if ’tis the gentleman who was here yesterday about the repeating watch; say, you believe we can’t get intelligence of it ’till tomorrow. For I lent it to Suky Straddle, to make a figure with it tonight at a tavern in Drury Lane. If t’other gentleman calls for the silver-hilted sword; you know Beetle-browed Jemmy hath it on, and he doth not come from Tunbridge ’till tuesday night; so that it cannot be had ’till then. Exit Polly.
Peachum
Dear wife, be a little pacified, don’t let your passion run away with your senses. Polly, I grant you, hath done a rash thing.
Mrs. Peachum
If she had only an intrigue with the fellow, why the very best families have excused and huddled up a frailty of that sort. ’Tis marriage, husband, that makes it a blemish.
Peachum
But money, wife, is the true fuller’s earth for reputations, there is not a spot or a stain but what it can take out. A rich rogue nowadays is fit company for any gentleman; and the world, my dear, hath not such a contempt for roguery as you imagine. I tell you, wife, I can make this match turn to our advantage.
Mrs. Peachum
I am very sensible, husband, that Captain Macheath is worth money, but I am in doubt whether he hath not two or three wives already, and then if he should die in a session or two, Polly’s dower would come into dispute.
Peachum
That, indeed, is a point which ought to be considered.
Air XI. A soldier and a sailor.
A fox may steal your hens, sir, A whore your health and pence, sir, Your daughter rob your chest, sir, Your wife may steal your rest, sir. A thief your goods and plate. But this is all but picking, With rest, pence, chest and chicken; It ever was decreed, sir, If lawyer’s hand is fee’d, sir, He steals your whole estate.
The lawyers are bitter enemies to those in our way. They don’t care that anybody should get a clandestine livelihood but themselves.
Enter Polly.
Polly
’Twas only Nimming Ned. He brought in a damask window-curtain, a hoop-petticoat, a pair of silver candlesticks, a periwig, and one silk stocking, from the fire that happened last night.
Peachum
There is not a fellow that is cleverer in his way, and saves more goods out of the fire than Ned.
